


The Phantom's Apprentice

by EaglePursuit



Series: Unfolded [3]
Category: The Owl House (Cartoon)
Genre: Blight family drama, F/F, Ghosts, Lumity, Treasure Hunting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:14:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29203428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EaglePursuit/pseuds/EaglePursuit
Summary: Part 3 of the Unfolded series. Amity's parents unexpectedly arrive home with a quest for her while she does her best to hide her new relationship from them. Can she find the Eye of Amun-Sipak for the Emperor's High Artificer and keep her parents from ending her budding romance with Luz?
Relationships: Alador Blight & Odalia Blight, Amity Blight & Edric Blight & Emira Blight, Amity Blight/Luz Noceda
Series: Unfolded [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1918171
Comments: 24
Kudos: 91





	1. Homecoming

**Author's Note:**

> Based on: Disney's The Owl House  
> Created by: Dana Terrace

The Phantom's Apprentice

Chapter 1

Homecoming

Amity kept her blankets pulled over herself, more out of fear that she’d float away than for warmth that summer night. Luz had been there — _ in my room! _ — mere hours before and she was still feeling effervescent. That morning, she had nervously given Luz the long overdue Grom-posal note; actually, the morning of the day before, she realized as she looked at her clock. Luz, she came to understand, had been distressed over whether Amity actually liked someone else, and had delayed reading it until that night. Once she had done so, she had immediately rushed to Blight Manor with the note in her hand and Grom tiara on her head, eager to see her. On the floor of her bedroom, only mere feet from where Amity was laying, they had confirmed their attraction to each other with a kiss and agreed to pursue a relationship.  _ It could not have been better! _ she reflected for the hundredth time with a satisfied sigh.

She stared up at the thick, wooden beams supporting the ceiling above her, bathed in the soft, blue moonlight that shone through her windows. The young witch idly considered casting a spell that would carve Luz’s name and a heart in the one directly overhead. In fact, she had already decided that she would. She was only contemplating whether to do it then, or to wait until morning.

A shadow flitted across her window, momentarily blocking the moonlight and her view of the ceiling beam. It distracted her from her thoughts.  _ It’s probably just some night demon out hunting. _ Blight Manor was situated on an estate outside the limits of Bonesborough, so there was more opportunity to encounter the purely wild beings of the Boiling Isles than in town.

There was a knock on her door, and without prompting, Edric’s voice, “Dad and Mom are home!” Amity didn’t respond. The warning was more a formality than a courtesy, all three Blight siblings knew what was expected of them. 

She swept her legs out from under her blanket to the floor and, after wearily standing up, walked to the window. It was the same latticed window Luz had leaped through into her arms, Amity remembered fondly. She looked out to the lawn below, the spot where Luz had been shouting and waving her hands was now occupied with the Blight’s elegant flying boat. Various suitcases, parcels, and accoutrements were floating out of the boat’s hold and into the Manor’s front door under spells that her parents cast. Amity recalled that the flying boat had been in their boathouse as recently as a few days ago. She had watched in irritation as Ed and Em returned in the family vehicle from some joyride. Evidently, their parents had summoned it to pick them up at the Emperor’s Castle earlier the day before when she was distracted with Larry the Soothsayer.

_ Larry! _ Amity looked over at her desk in alarm. The grotesque severed head was still sitting there, having gone silent shortly after Luz had left. She would have to deal with it somehow before her mother came by to inspect her room. Part of her wanted to keep it for the role it played in bringing Luz and herself together. Part of her wanted to give it back to Luz to keep. Part of her wanted to put it back in the garbage can where she found it, because she didn’t think she’d be able to handle looking at it for much longer; it was really weird. She quickly pushed it off the desk. It fell into her pink satchel with a thump, and she closed the flap over it. It would have to do until she could find an excuse to leave the house and dispose of it.

Grabbing a band off her vanity, she pulled her hair into her usual half-up ponytail and straightened her fine, silk pajamas, which were a shade of pearlescent pink with white buttons. There were definitely perks to being a Blight. She examined herself in the mirror. Her brown roots were becoming more visible. She suspected her mother would cast the hair dye spell on her again soon, now that she was home again. Odalia always said it was important for the family to show a united front, though Amity was confused as to why her father didn’t have to dye his brown hair green as well.

She stepped out into the hall and noticed that each and every chandelier and sconce in their home was lit, despite the late hour. Stoically striding past the dour portraits of ancestral Blights, she dodged one of her mother’s suitcases floating its way up the stairs. She paused to reflect on the memory, just hours old, of giggling at Luz as the silly human impersonated the voices of some particularly grim members of the family. Her mother would have considered it pure sacrilege. She shook the thought from her head. At the bottom of the stairs, a parade of levitating objects was wending its way through the front door and dispersing to their appropriate locations throughout the house.

Amity slipped into the parlor where Edric and Emira were already waiting, bleary eyed in their matching burgundy pajamas. This was a custom of their household. No matter the hour, the children would awaken, or simply get out of bed in Amity’s case, and greet their parents upon arrival from a long absence. The twins were lounging in the ostentatious armchairs, watching the flow of objects pass by. Amity turned to see a heavy box of files bump into the door jamb, then ponderously navigate its way down the hall to her father’s study. There seemed to be more to unload than usual; she suspected commensurate with the unusual length of time her parents had been absent.

Finally, the last few items trickled in, and the twins stood up and formed a line abreast with Amity in rote formality. A pair of soiled table settings floated through the parlor on their way to the kitchen sink, and the elder Blights followed them in.

Alador took off a high-collared suit jacket, festooned with embroidered accents, to reveal a dark velvet waistcoat. He traced a pink circle as he threw the jacket into the corner, which deftly vanished with a poof and teleported to his closet. It was undoubtedly draping itself over a hanger at that very moment, Amity expected.

Odalia came into the parlor in a smart, gray riding habit that she had worn against the brisk wind on the flying boat. She gave all three of her offspring a quick hug. Amity noted that her mother was wearing a new, striking shade of violet eye liner. The woman knew exactly how to compose herself for maximum effect.

She stood aside and watched as her husband paced in front of the children, stroking his wispy goatee thoughtfully. The mood grew tense as they waited for him to speak. Suddenly, and with a jocular wink at Edric, he stopped short and turned to address them. “Well, I suppose the Manor is more or less how we left it.” He stepped in front of his youngest daughter with a stern look on his face. Amity’s heart skipped a beat as it belatedly occurred to her that he might have been checking some kind of warding spells that they left to monitor the house in their absence. She wanted to squirm but didn’t dare to. After what seemed like hours, he cracked a smile on his narrow face and pulled a pair of items out of an inner pocket in his waistcoat. “I hope you didn’t miss us too terribly, dear Amity.” 

He gave her the objects in his hand. One was a candy bar. It was made of chocolate with blood-crickets inside that gave it a texture that was both crunchy and gooey. It was a variety of candy that she wasn’t particularly fond of, though she dared not tell him that. The other object was a cheap souvenir pen. The back end of it was transparent with a picture of the Emperor’s Castle inside. The drawbridge extended and retracted if the pen was tilted one way or the other. Amity gave him a perfunctory smile as she accepted the gifts. She already had a dozen of the pens in her desk upstairs. “Not too much. Thank you, Father.”

“Did anything interesting happen while we were gone?” he asked as he presented the same gifts to her siblings.

Amity could practically feel the twins side-eying her, waiting for her to respond first. “I, uh...was in the school play. Other than that, nothing important happened,” she lied awkwardly. A memory of kissing Luz on the auditorium stage flashed intrusively in her brain and made her flinch.

Edric and Emira stumbled over themselves to concur with her assessment and commend her performance in the play.

She’d had some notion that she would be hiding her new relationship from her parents, but in the haze of infatuation, she hadn’t put much consideration into how that was going to play out. She expected that, given the level of control they chose to exert over other aspects of her social life, if they didn’t approve, they would find a way to dissolve it. _One way or another,_ she thought circumspectly. Facing them in person gave her the sobering realization that it would be much more difficult than she initially thought. There were myriad ways they could discover it, from direct observation to snooping through her Penstagram to secondhand gossip. _And worst of all, Ed or Em could simply reveal the whole thing if they feel like it._ _They can blackmail me all over again._

“Hmm, I’m sorry we missed it. It sounds like it was quite a show,” Alador said with patronizing indifference and patted her on the head. “In any case, your mother has a special treat for you all.”

He backed up as Odalia took the middle of the room. It was something she adored, having all eyes on her; she drew energy from it. She seemed to blossom as the center of attention, with a presence that captivated her audience. Amity had heard more than once how her mother had been the fastest student to ever defeat Grometheus. And of course, Odalia herself told the story best. If she hadn’t demonstrated an early aptitude for the oracle track, she would certainly have ended up in illusions; such was her flair for spectacle. Amity supposed that if multi-track studying had been permitted back then, as Luz had recently convinced Principal Bump to allow, Odalia would have been in both.

She looked each of them in the eye with a coy smile as she began, “Children, the Blights have been honored with a rare opportunity to earn the esteem of the Emperor’s Court. The most diligent High Artificer has learned of several unique and magical objects of immense interest. We must seek them out. They are critical to the completion of a new project; the one that has kept us from our beloved children for so long.” She gave them a sympathetic look. “The Emperor has extended this duty to us at our request. Your father and I will be handling the demon’s share of the list, of course. But we thought it would be fun to include you three on the scavenger hunt as well.” She beamed a refulgent smile at the three teens.

Amity glanced at her siblings. Their faces were masks of adoration, same as her own, but she could see the disingenuousness in their eyes. Emira spoke up on their behalf, “What will we be looking for, Mother?”

“We only want you three to find one thing, the Eye of Amun-Sipak. Work together and I’m sure you’ll have it in no time, Titan willing.” Odalia regarded her children confidently.

Edric arched his brow. “So, what is this Eye? What is Amun-Sipak?”

“The High Artificer was light on details, I’m afraid. You’ll have to figure that out on your own.” Odalia released an artful sigh that was belied by a crafty glint in her eye. “At any rate, you three can start on it tomorrow. We’ve all been up much too long for further discussion.” She dismissed them with an elegant sweep of her hand. “Off to bed with you!”

Amity trudged back up the stairs behind Emira and Edric in a state of mild panic. She had to come up with a plan to keep her parents from finding out about Luz for as long as possible. But her brother and sister were mulling over their new unasked for assignment.

Emira rolled her eyes as they reached the top of the stairs. “Well, I don’t know about you two, but I don’t want to waste my time on some wild demon chase.”

“Me neither,” fumed Edric. “Eye of Amun-Sipak, indeed! We’ve been cooped up inside the Manor for a month and they expect us to jump straight into a stack of books after school just so they can look good in front of Belos? I don’t think so!” In fact, neither he nor Emira had paid any heed to the prohibition on leaving the house unnecessarily, unlike Amity.

Emira grinned conspiratorially at her twin. It made her look very much like her mother. “If only we knew someone who loves the library so much, she would go there every day if she could.”

Edric nodded and glanced back as Amity. “Looks like this one’s all on you, Mittens.”

“Why should I do all the work!?” She glared back crossly.

“Because” —Emira gave her a flash of her most devious smile— “Loose lips sink Luz ships.”

Amity took her meaning and grumbled as she opened the door to her own bedroom.  _ So that’s how it’s going to be? Titan, help me. _

Coming soon:

Chapter 2: Tales of the [redacted]


	2. Tales of the [redacted]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luz is excited to meet her new girlfriend before school, but Amity has some bad news for her. At least they can spend some time at the library together afterwards, as Amity works on her mysterious quest and draws Luz into it too.

Chapter 2

Tales of the [redacted]

Students in Hexside uniforms were filtering onto the school’s banner-lined promenade in the bright morning sun as Luz watched, bouncing from one foot to the other. She was so excited for her new girlfriend to arrive that it was difficult for her to remain still. She was certain that any minute, Amity would round the corner and walk through the main gate, as she had every morning since Luz had returned to Hexside after her encounter with Emperor Belos. The human teen had come to school extra early that day to make sure she didn’t miss the chance to meet Amity at the door and walk inside with her, hand in hand. She even arrived before Principal Bump, who was surprised to find her waiting for the front gate to be unlocked.

The Luz that had waltzed into the Owl House the night before was a far cry from the one that had stumbled in, miserable and defeated, the morning prior. That night she had been in a joyful and vibrant mood, so much so that she even engaged Hooty in conversation, since he was the only one awake at that hour. She shared her good news with him and he, in turn, reciprocated with a confusing and dubious anecdote about having once dated a bungalow. Or perhaps it was a ski chalet. She had kind of zoned out in the middle of it.

Her irrepressible good spirits continued unabated through the following morning, much to the chagrin of the Clawthorne sisters, whom she roused from nest and couch with exuberant ‘good morning’s. Luz made everyone apple-blood pancakes shaped like hearts for breakfast, and delighted in enumerating for them every excruciatingly minute detail of her encounter with Amity the night before. The girl babbled on and on until Eda could no longer tolerate her incessant chattering and sent her to school. Eda was more than pleased for her, of course, but there was only so much of Luz’s ‘morning person’ energy she could stand.

The only disappointment for Luz was that neither Willow nor Gus were at all surprised that she and Amity had begun dating. She had eagerly ambushed them with the announcement as soon as they stepped foot onto the school grounds. They both seemed to feel that the pair’s shared attraction had been glaringly obvious for some time, which confused her to the extent that she began questioning them about which specific moments caused them to reach that conclusion. At that point, they had quickly excused themselves to go to their lockers.

Luz was so intent on watching for Amity to walk between the coven banners on the promenade that she failed to notice the luxuriously-appointed flying boat with a bright white awning alighting on the lawn nearby until it was firmly settled in the grass. Only when the gangplank dropped did it occur to her that it was the one that had come to rescue her from the shore of Lake Lacuna, and that it had been captained by none other than Emira and Edric, Amity’s siblings. She leaped from the school steps and ran up to the smooth, lacquered side of the boat as the twins disembarked. “Blights!” she greeted them.

“Luz!” they replied in unison as they walked past on either side, smiling devilishly at her. 

“Do anything fun last night?” Emira asked coyly.

Luz turned as they went by and flashed them a smug grin. “You know I did!”

“We do!” Edric winked. “And your ‘fun’ is right behind you.”

Luz spun back around and found her girlfriend at the bottom of the gangplank, having just disembarked and was looking at her with a cryptic expression. “Amity! ¡Mi Corazon!” She lunged at the smaller witch with her arms wide for a hug.

Amity’s face blanched and her eyes grew wide as she saw Luz swooping in. She quickly traced a pink circle in the air with her finger and Luz ran face first into the gooey, purple torso of a freshly summoned abomination. Her momentum was rapidly abated by the thick matrix of its trunk and she struggled to push through it.

“Me core-a-zone? What does that mean?” asked a feminine voice from the deck of the flying boat.

Luz was thoroughly entrapped in the viscous body of Amity’s abomination with her face being the only part of her that managed to fully pass through it. She looked up to see an imperious woman in a sharply tailored dress eyeing her curiously. The woman’s green hair had been swept up into a tight bun on her head that gave her a severe appearance. Her eyes were golden like Amity’s and shrewdly narrowed. “It means, uh...study buddy, Mom,” Amity explained awkwardly. “The human...and I...are...working on a project together.”

“Very well. Don’t let her bring down your grade. Have a good day, dear.” Odalia pursed her lips and turned back to take control of the family’s vessel.

Amity released the abomination as the boat lifted off the ground and flapped away on powerful wings. Luz hastily wiped the remaining purple goo off her face.  _ Study buddies!? We’re dating...I thought. _ Her heart sank. Seconds before she had been so pleased to see Amity, but the way she was acting confused Luz.  _ Did I misunderstand something? Are we not together? _ “Um. What was that about?”

The green-haired witch grimaced and helped by flicking bits of abomination glop from Luz’s uniform. “Sorry, Luz. I can’t have my mom and dad finding out about,” —she lowered her voice— “us.”

“Why?” Luz puzzled, then she gasped. Her eyes sparkled with welling tears. “Are you ashamed of me because I’m human?” The possibility seared her heart and she was suddenly queasy.

Amity shook her head slowly and sighed. “No. It’s just, well, you saw what they made me do to Willow just because she didn’t have her magic yet. They want me to have powerful social connections that I can exploit to advance my position, and you’re…an outlaw’s apprentice. They’d think you’re holding me back. They’d make me stop seeing you.”

Luz couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “And you would just let them?”

“It’s not a matter of ‘letting’. They have influence, Luz. They could get you kicked out of Hexside, or even worse. I don’t want to have that happen to you because of me.”

Luz closed her eyes and took a deep breath.  _ This isn’t at all what I was expecting, but I don’t want to lose what we started, either. I still want to make this work.  _ “Okay, Amity. We’ll keep it on the down low from your parents…for now. Let’s just go inside.” She held her hand out to her girlfriend.

Amity shook her head, declining to take it. “We can’t let anyone know. It will get back to them somehow.” She started walking towards the door. 

Luz let her hand fall to her side and walked next to her.  _ I need to ask Willow and Gus not to tell anyone either, I guess. _ She felt like her ribs had been crushed all over again. She wanted to lay down on the grass and pull her hood over her face, however she kept walking.

“But do you want to go to the library after school? We can hang out together in my hideout.” Amity looked her way slyly.

Perhaps the green-haired witch had noticed her mood beginning to spiral downward. Or perhaps she had merely wanted to get the bad news out of the way first. Whatever the case, Luz forgot about her hurt feelings momentarily as the implication hit her. “Our first date? Yes, the library. It’s perfect!” she practically sang. “I’ll sneak in snacks. And we can cuddle on some beanbag chairs and read Good Witch Azura books!” 

To that, Amity giggled, a sound that made Luz buzz with delight. “Yeah, I guess it is. I do have some actual studying I need to do though.”

“Oh, me too. I’m gonna study up on how to get me another kiss.” Luz smirked back at her flirtatiously.

Amity turned bright pink and glanced around furtively at the few students who were still lingering in the fresh morning air before their first classes.  _ How did I never notice how cute that is?  _

“Luz!” She whispered, “Keep your voice down.”

The human ran ahead as they climbed the steps and held the door. “After you, study buddy.” At the atrium they parted ways, she to her beginners’ oracles class and Amity to abominations, intermediate dominance. Luz watched her disappear into the crowd of taller students, with only a brief glance back to indicate that the green-haired girl was thinking about her at all.

The rest of the school day was torment for Luz. She spent her class periods thinking about Amity and counting the minutes until she could see her again. In Oracles 101, her crystal ball kept stubbornly returning an ORA-12154 error, despite her best efforts scrying the compiler. She didn’t fare much better in runes either. She struggled to focus on her classwork and had to turn in her assignment half complete. The one bright point was that she figured out how to write Amity’s name in the esoteric alphabet, which she then used to fill several pages of her notebook. Healing class, though, was a complete disaster. She accidentally activated a fire glyph instead of a healing glyph on a specimen of animated flesh and gave the teacher, Mr. Skanderby, an unexpected opportunity to lecture the students on burn treatment.

In between each class, she rushed to Amity’s locker only for her girlfriend to coolly ignore her presence. She hadn’t understood until that day precisely how good Amity was at self-control. The young witch acted as if the girl she had kissed and held hands with the night before was like a complete stranger to her. By lunch Luz was a wreck. Amity had a different lunch period than her, so she sat in sullen silence with Willow and Gus and prodded her mystery meat unenthusiastically as it attempted to escape her tray. Her lofty expectations for the day were utterly destroyed and her morale was flagging dangerously . The only thing that kept her going was the anticipation of their library date.

At the end of school, she caught up with Amity in the atrium and walked with her outside. The Blight’s stately air-boat had already returned to the spot on the grass where it had alighted that morning. Amity didn’t even look at her. “Meet me at the library in twenty minutes, okay?” she asked out of the corner of her mouth.

Luz sighed forlornly. “Okay. That will give me time to get some snacks, I guess.” She walked out the front gate and headed in the direction of the market square as Amity boarded the boat without so much as a hug.

When she arrived at the library she found her girlfriend with a stack of books and two bean bag chairs in her hideout. Her mood lifted considerably when Amity greeted her with a warm, tender smile. “Close the door, please. I don’t want anyone walking in on us.”

“Right.” Luz did as she was bidden and plopped down on a bean bag next to Amity with her satchel on her lap. “Hey, study buddy.” —she reached into the bag and began pulling out snacks— “I got Mummy Worms, and I couldn’t decide between Hex Mix and Cheesy Abracadabitz, so I got them both! Plus, I got the most horrifying, monstrous snack of them all— behold, kale chips! And of course, here’s something to wash it all down with.” She handed Amity a bottle of Scary Cola, then opened the bag of Mummy Worms and offered some to the green-haired witch.

Amity set the book she was reading down on her lap and popped a few in her mouth. “Thanks.” Luz looked over and noticed that the book was filled with pictures of necklaces. “Sorry about school, Luz. I don’t want to ignore you, but I don’t want to take a chance either, you know?”

“I get it,” Luz groused. “But I hope it doesn’t have to be that way all the time. I’d like to be able to enjoy being with you in public, you know. Where are we going to go on dates? Graveyards and abandoned buildings?”

“I’m sorry, Luz, I really am. I just can’t win against my parents.” Amity grabbed her hand and squeezed. “But don’t worry. We’ll figure something out.”

“Yeah, I guess,” she responded glumly.  _ This is no way to start off our first date. Time to make some moves. _ Luz leaned across the bean bags and slid an arm around Amity’s shoulder. Amity snuggled up against her in a way that felt both natural and exciting. Luz could smell the delicate fragrance of flowers in her hair and noticed something different. “Oh, your hair is, uh…greener than normal.”

Amity turned the page of her book. “Yeah. Mom cast the dye spell on me again this morning.” Her tone was somewhere between indifferent and slightly annoyed.

“It, uh...looks good,” Luz said lamely.  _ Gah. What am I doing? Think of something else to say!  _ “So, what are you researching?”

“I need to find a magical object called the Eye of Amun-Sipak for my parents. So far I’ve figured out that it’s some kind of amulet. See?” She held the book up.

Luz leaned in closer and caught another whiff of Amity’s shampoo. A good scent, she decided, but suddenly wondered if Amity liked her own. She’d never considered what her shower products smelled like before and couldn’t even remember.  _ I’d better check when I get back to the Owl House.  _ “Which one is it?”

“Oh, that’s weird.” Amity scrutinized the page. “The caption says it should be the fourth one from the left, but there are only three and an Emperor’s Coven emblem. At any rate, it belonged to a wise king from the early Savage Ages.” She pointed out the name.

“Amun-Sipak? He was so great they named his amulet after him.”

“Yeah.” Amity closed the book. “I guess I need to find out more about him.” She set it on the floor and chose another from the middle of her stack.

“It’s kind of a weird name though, right?” Luz pondered aloud. “Like, everyone’s name here is pretty consistently one word. That guy’s name is totally different; like it’s from another language or something.”

The completely green-haired witch furrowed her brow for a moment. “ Hmmm. We’ve only spoken Islander here as far as I know, even in the Savage Ages.” She glanced over at Luz. “Does everyone speak Islander in the human realm?”

Luz sucked in a breath as a pang of homesickness washed over her. She didn’t like thinking about home. It hurt too much. She only did so late at night and often cried herself to sleep afterwards. She exhaled and let the feeling subside before responding, “A lot of people do, but there are a bunch other languages too. Like Spanish. And we don’t call it Islander, although it does come from an island.”

“I wish we could go there. It sounds neat. Do you think we could do stuff together there without hiding?”

“Yeah.” Luz sighed.  _ So, maybe that’s where she was thinking of for going on dates. _ “But we can’t go anymore. The Emperor wanted me to give him Eda’s door to the human realm and I destroyed it.”

“You what!?”

“Hey! I don’t think he had good plans for it,” Luz explained tersely. She bristled at the inference that she had done wrong. “So, anyway. I’m stuck here now.”

Amity mulled it over. It was obvious she didn’t approve of how Luz had handled the situation. “Well, on the bright side, I guess you won’t be disappearing from my life unexpectedly.”

“Yeah, that’s for sure!” the human laughed in relief. “But it gives me an idea. Maybe I can find some kind of book on other ways to get to the human realm.” She reluctantly unwrapped her arm from Amity’s shoulders and rolled off the bean bag chair. Slipping out of the hideout, Luz went straight to the demonic card catalog. She tried several different subjects, starting with ‘human realm’ and ‘portal’ before finding a single book under ‘doors, magic’. It was not the kind of book she was anticipating.

“A children’s fairytale, Luz?” Amity questioned her with an arched eyebrow when she plopped back down on her bean bag. “If you needed me to help you with the demonic decimal system, you could’ve just asked.”

“Pfft, no. This isn’t my first library rodeo, girlfriend. This is seriously all that they had.” She flipped it open. There were colorful pictures and rhyming words on each page, which she began to read. The first page had a picture of a quaint town hiding behind a high wall against a backdrop of sprawling red forest.

_ In Elbonia was a town _

_ The safest of them all _

_ No Titan-spawn could e’er bring down _

_ Their massive, bony wall _

The following page featured a blond-bearded witch in fine, metal armor and a crown looking thoughtfully at a barbican surrounded by injured warriors as people in peasant garb stared down from between the crenulations.

_ Amun-Sipak the Conqueror _

_ Desir’d it for his gain _

_ He fought and warred outside their door _

_ And wasted years in vain _

_ In his tenth year came the idea _

_ To take the town by cunning _

_ The fine folk of Elbonia _

_ Were sure to find it stunning _

The page after that showed the same king using a staff to pry grisly orbs from the eye sockets of a gigantic horned skull. Luz could tell it was meant to be the head of the Titan. She had seen it once when Eda took her on Owlbert high above the ground so she could look at the whole Isles. Another picture showed soldiers entering a freestanding door with an eye on it. It was not precisely the same as the one she had walked through to get to the Boiling Isles, but it was clearly the same idea.

_ Took the eyes from Titanskull _

_ And turned one to a door _

_ In which he marched his army whole _

_ Then folded it half o’er _

Luz turned the page again. The next picture showed a box decorated with the same eye on the ground outside the barbican. The peasants were standing in a semicircle, regarding it with interest.

_ He left then, in abject defeat _

_ A wonder to their eyes _

_ For on the ground below their feet _

_ Was a most cur’ous prize _

The townsfolk carried the box into the barbican’s open gate, high over their heads with cheerful smiles on their faces.

_ What could it be? This strange, eyed case  _

_ Ingeniously created _

_ They carried it within their gates _

_ And then they celebrated _

The next picture showed what looked to be a square in the middle of the town. The moon was high in the dark sky and peasants armed with spears were napping against the sides of buildings. The door appeared with glowing rays, a visual shorthand for magical happenings, and the witch king’s army coming out of it.

_ The fearsome gift, though, did unfold _

_ While folk happily slept _

_ And so they failed, then, to behold _

_ From whence an army crept _

The final scene showed the simple wooden buildings of the town set ablaze. The unhappy peasants were lined up outside the barbican, guarded by soldiers. The witch king was looking onward with vengeance burning in his eyes. It was clearly intended to parallel the initial appearance of the conqueror on the second page.

_ And so the town was made to burn _

_ The townsfolk put to sword _

_ That fear which every witch should learn _

_ Is that Titan-eyed door _

Luz looked up from the children’s storybook wide-eyed. “Did you hear that, Amity? Your Amun-Sipak made a door. Maybe it’s even the same as Eda’s door!”

“It’s a fairytale, Luz. They aren’t real.” Amity implored. “And even if it was, how do we know it’s the same king? Yours is a warlord and mine is a wise leader.”

“Well, how many Amun-Sipaks are in your book of Savage Age monarchs?” She cocked her head to the side askance. Amity had been busy researching while Luz had been looking for books on the human realm.

Amity’s mouth pinched tight for a moment. “Uh...well, just one, I think. But there’s a problem...” She turned the history book around for Luz to see. Amun-Sipak’s entry started with his name, then page after page was blank except for Emperor’s Coven emblems and the phrase ‘Edited by the Emperor’s Educational Reform Edict’ over and over. “All the books are like this.”

Luz’s face flushed and she was barely capable of speaking in her inchoate rage.  _ This could have been my ticket home, and he erased it! The Emperor is erasing books!  _ “Kikimora,” she whispered.

“Excuse me?” Amity looked at her, confused.

“Lilith told me that while she led the Emperor’s Coven and its special task force for capturing wild witches, Belos’s assistant handled the more subtle aspects of enforcing his will, like making sure the news reports don’t say anything bad about him. Her name is Kikimora. According to Lilith, she’s not a very nice person. But she said it with some very unflattering words.”

“Huh. I’ve seen her on the news before. My parents say she’s very influential in the court.”

Luz stabbed the emblem on the page with her finger. “Don’t you see? This is censorship, Amity! The Emperor is keeping people from reading about this!”

“Maybe there’s a good reason. Maybe it was dangerous.” Amity’s tone was stern and slightly warning.

“Dangerous for him, maybe.” Luz mumbled.  _ I won’t push it. I don’t want to start a fight on our first date.  _ “Well, did they leave us anything to read about this Amun-Sipak?”

Amity turned a few more pages, all blanked except a single, small paragraph in the middle of the last one. Luz leaned against her and read it aloud. “King Amun-Sipak lost his left arm in a battle near the edge of the Strait of Tibia. At the site of the fighting he founded the city of Ossburgh, now called Bonesborough.” Luz looked up. “He founded your town.”

“According to this book, he did.” The Blight girl shut her eyes aloofly. “But I’ve never heard anything like that before.”

Luz slumped back onto her own bean bag. She felt like she needed to vent her frustration. She grabbed a mummy worm from the bag and ripped the end off with her teeth. “Ugh, don’t you just wish you could go back in time and ask him? It could clear up so much.”

Amity pursed her lips in thought. “I don’t know about going back in time. But—” She hesitated and looked down. “There might be a way we can still ask him.”

“What’s that?” Luz chewed the leathery snack thoughtfully.

Amity looked away. “No. It’s forbidden. Forget I said anything.”

“Lots of stuff is forbidden around here,” Luz said pointedly through the half-chewed snack. “How many laws did we break when we went into Willow’s mind and saved her?”

A long sigh escaped Amity’s lips. “Okay, look. Just because it’s forbidden doesn’t mean some people don’t do it. It’s—it’s necromancy. And it’s popular with school kids who haven’t joined a coven yet. They summon spirits to help them cheat on tests or whatever.”

Luz sat up straight and leaned close to Amity’s face, giving her girlfriend her undivided attention.  _ Ooooh, maybe there’s a dark side to her after all! _ She smiled teasingly. “And have you done any necromancy, my dear?”

“Hey, of course not!” Amity’s face clouded with indignance. “You know I hate cheating.” Then her tone shifted to condemnation. “But Boscha does it. We can go find her right now.”

Luz smirked disdainfully. “Boscha? Well, I don’t want to talk to her. Let’s ask Eda. I bet she knows how to summon spirits. She can’t do it herself, of course, but she can probably teach you.”

“I’m not doing it, Luz!”

The human sighed in resignation and lolled her eyes at the ceiling of Amity’s library hideout. “Fine. We’ll get Boscha. I guess this date’s over with.”

“Don’t worry. There will be more.” Amity leaned into her and pressed her lips on Luz’s, taking her by sweet surprise.

Amity broke away several moments later to catch her breath. Luz’s face felt hot with emotion. “Poggers.”

“Pardon?” The green-haired witch was apparently unfamiliar with the term.

Luz explained as her cheeks returned to their normal complexion, “Poggers. You know...it’s like ‘wow’.”

“Huh. Must be a human thing. It’s kinda cute. Now let’s go find Boscha.”

Coming soon

Chapter 3: The Deal with Boscha


	3. The Deal with Boscha

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amity and Luz pay a visit to Boscha to enlist her necromantic skills in their quest

Chapter 3

The Deal with Boscha

Amity peered around the bleachers at the Hexside grudgby pitch. The bright purple sky was giving way to a deep, murky blue as the light of day gradually surrendered to nightfall. The field’s demonic overhead illuminators had awoken and were flickering to life with gaping yawns, rendering the playing surface over-bright with their cold, surreal luminescence. “I was right. She’s still here. Boscha doesn’t let anyone go home until they’re completely wiped.”

Six teens were dressed in pads and eye paint in the middle of the field. The tall, three-eyed grudgby captain was running the starters through plays against the school’s practice squad. Everyone looked exhausted, but Boscha’s voice continued to ring out clear and strong as she aggressively harangued Cat for missing a catch. The practice squad looked especially beat up, spent, and demoralized. They didn’t seem to belong there at all. Amity half-wondered if Principal Bump was putting students on the grudgby practice squad as a form of punishment while the detention hall was out of order.

Luz stuck her head around the corner as well. Amity could feel the human girl’s warmth pressing up behind her. It was comforting. It was exciting. Luz seemed like she viewed a personal boundary as something that was meant to be broken. But with the new phase of their relationship...Amity’s awareness of it was heightened. She knew she should push her away, but was reluctant at the same time.  _ Maybe it’s okay…just for a moment. _ Even as she indulged in that small mote of intimacy, she hated. She hated that they had to hide the fact that they were together. She hated that it was her fault. And her parents’ fault. And she hated the expectations that Blights had to live up to. She hated the rigid social hierarchy that dictated her life.

“Whoa. I didn’t know Mattholomule played grudgby,” Luz said, interrupting Amity’s dark reverie as she caught sight of the small boy on the practice squad. He was attempting to guard Boscha and prevent her from making a catch. The ball flew into the air. She leaped and grabbed it at the apogee of its arc, then came down, extending her knee directly into his face. It wasn’t an accident; she could have avoided the contact. He fell with a hard thump, but Boscha rushed by with the ball in hand, indifferent to the pained protestations of the smaller boy as he clutched his rapidly swelling visage on the ground.

The couple ducked back behind the massive block of concrete. “Okay, Luz. Remember, no one can know we’re dating. Especially Boscha. Her mom and my mom are friends.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know the drill, study buddy.” She sighed reluctantly. They casually rounded the corner and climbed the stairs into the stands to watch the remainder of the practice. Cat missed the ball again, and Boscha proceeded to give her another tongue-lashing, while threatening her with a lash made out of actual tongues. Long sinuous, forked tongues that dripped green venom from sharp barbs. Amity cringed at the sight of it. She had wielded that whip when she was grudgby captain. It seemed like a lifetime ago.  _ Before Luz. _ Cat walked back to her position with glistening trails running over her eye paint. “I think Boscha’s got a bad case of jock witch,” Luz whispered to Amity.

“Uh huh.” She was only half listening. Her girlfriend’s disappointment hung heavily on her. Guilt stung her conscience and she looked down at their feet, resting side by side on the bleacher in front of her; her own black ankle boots and Luz’s larger, white flats.  _ It’s for the best though. She has to know that this will all end if my parents find out. It has to be this way or it won’t be at all. Em and Ed can disguise themselves with illusions and do whatever they want. I wish there was some way I could just...not be a Blight for a while.  _ She looked at the setting sun’s last rays splashing against the Titan’s lofty ribs.  _ Luz is right. We can’t hide like this forever. But if we don’t, it’s over. We can’t go back to her realm, and we can’t openly be together in mine.  _ She sighed inwardly. _ I wish there was something else. Some other way. _

The practice ended with Boscha ordering both squads to do wind-sprints down the length of the pitch and back again with the hazards running at maximum, and lambasting them as they went. All three members of the practice squad were vomiting piteously on the sideline before it was done, and Boscha herded the team into the locker rooms without even a commendation for their hard work. “Now’s our chance,” Luz hissed. The locker rooms shared a building with the concessions stand behind the bleachers. The two tarried long enough for all the players to go inside then they hurried to the door to the girls’ lockers and took positions on either side of it. They could hear Boscha’s voice inside, levying yet more criticism on the others. “She doesn’t stop, does she?” Luz shook her head in disbelief.

Amity had known Boscha Newcombe, the eldest daughter and heir of an esteemed duke, for most of her life; their mothers having set up playdates together at the Slayground from an early age. The three-eyed girl had always been relentlessly driven, merciless, and unyielding. Amity’s mother had clearly hoped it would rub off on her, and back then, she would do her best to emulate Boscha’s brusque behavior. It had been surprisingly effective. Odalia was pleased with the results and Boscha even included her in her clique for a time. 

She learned to use the cruelty that she learned as a sword and a shield, sparring with others and protecting herself from her own insecurities. And she hid away the parts of herself that she loved from the rest of the Boiling Isles, considering them weaknesses. Amity had thought she’d found her place in the world. She had been Top Student and the protege of the mistress of the Emperor’s Coven. Her life had seemed to be in balance and her trajectory had been upward. She had everything she thought she wanted just within her grasp.  _ And then Luz arrived. _

Suddenly, the door flew open and Boscha burst out of the locker room with long, purposeful strides. Her magenta hair was wet from showering, and she wore her signature letter jacket over her potions track uniform with a gym bag slung on one of her shoulders. The expression on her face was set hard, as if she had already forgotten about the grudgby practice and was deeply focused on whatever laid ahead in her evening’s agenda. She turned towards Luz, saw her, and stopped in her tracks. “What are you doing here, human? Looking for a rematch?” she sneered. Luz gave her a meek wave and said nothing. Amity took a step behind her and the tall girl heard it, whirling around lightning fast. “Ugh. You’re here too, Blight? What do you want?”

“We need your help.” Amity regarded her flatly. “With necromancy.”

Boscha’s lips curled into a sneering grin. “I thought you didn’t do necromancy, Blight. I thought you were too perfect for that.”

“I’m not doing it. You are.” The two girls stared at each other tensely. Amity could tell that Boscha’s social calculations equated her as an enemy instead of a friend. But there were still variables that Boscha didn’t fully understand, that made her unsure, and Amity could exploit them. She held her ground against the taller girl.

Finally, Boscha snorted, “And why should I?”

“Because,” —Luz jumped in and slowly circled around the bully as she spoke before standing next to Amity with her arms crossed— “if you don’t, I’m going to tell Principal Bump that you released pixies in the school and caused that infestation.”

Boscha rolled all three of her eyes. “Like he’d care. I’m the star of the grudgby team, remember? The school board would probably buy me a whole troupe before they would ever have me expelled.” She laughed derisively, then her face lit up and a cunning smile propagated across her lips. “Oh, I have an idea.” She turned her icy, cruel gaze towards Amity. “You remember how we were gonna sneak into Glandus and steal their mascot; before you quit my crew to hang out with Round Ears here and Half-a-Witch?”

“Yeah, so?” Amity snarled back.  _ Is she seriously still going on about that!?  _ It was a plan they had conceived at Boscha’s Treasure Shack hideout several months prior. Boscha had wanted to pull a prank on Hexside’s rival, Glandus High, to get revenge for a lost grudgby game and to prove they were the better team. They would sneak in, steal the mascot, and escape back to Bonesborough under the cover of night.

“So...” Boscha leveled a finger at the green-haired girl. “I still need an abomination to do the heavy lifting. If you agree to help me with that job, I’ll cast your little necromancy spell, no questions asked.”

Luz looked adamantly at the bully and took a step forward. “If you’re making her help with your prank, then I want in too!”

“Luz!” Amity cried warningly.  _ You’re going to give us away! _

Boscha shook her head, maintaining eye contact with Amity. “No way. I’m not bringing this dweeb along. She can’t do anything right.”

Amity had heard enough. Watching the bully degrade her girlfriend over and over rankled her, and she stepped up next to Luz and matched Boscha’s glare with her own. “She’s in.”

Boscha hesitated a moment, her eyes shrewdly piercing them, then slumped her shoulders and released a sarcastic sigh. “Fine. Whatever. I don’t care if the human carries it or your abomination. But if the job goes sour, she gets left behind.”

Luz glanced over at Amity. “Er, what is the Glandus mascot?”

“They’re the Minotaurs.”

“Oh.” Luz’s eyes grew wide. “Poggers. So, is the mascot, like, a real—”

_ There’s that adorable word again, _ Amity thought, distracted by a resurgent wave of infatuation.

“What kind of necromancy do you need, Blight?” Boscha interrupted. “Finally going to cheat on a test? Or maybe you just need a date.”

Amity blinked as she caught up with the question. “Not a chance,” she said wryly. “This is Blight business, no questions asked, remember? We need to talk to a specific ghost. A phantom. An old one.”

Boscha nodded in mock sageness. “Oh, in that case, I’m going to need something from the phantom to focus the spell on. Like, a relic or something they owned.” She looked at the pair expectantly.

Luz and Amity grimaced at each other. “Uh…” 

Then Luz’s face lit up. “Oh wait. Remember, he lost his arm in that battle where he founded Ossburgh.”

“Right! And Bonesborough was Ossburgh.” Amity could see where Luz was going with it. “The battle site and the arm should be here somewhere.”

Luz continued, “And the best place to look should be the oldest part of town.”

“That’s obviously the Old Quarter, where the Slayground is!” The green-haired witch snapped her fingers.

“Ugh. Titan puke on me!” Boscha simply rolled her eyes. “What is with you two. That was almost too gross to watch.”

Amity stared daggers at her. Boscha might be a bully, but she was canny and good at reading people. They would need to be on their toes around her. “Let’s just go. We’re wasting time.”

Coming soon

Chapter 4: A Bone to Pick


	4. A Bone to Pick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luz, Amity, and Boscha head to the Old Quarter of Bonesborough to cast a forbidden spell

Chapter 4

A Bone to Pick

The stars began to twinkle in the sky as Luz and Amity followed Boscha’s long strides into the old heart of Bonesborough. The smooth street surface transitioned to rough cobbles, set in haphazard patchworks with the odd interstitial fieldstone or paver offering unique opportunities to trip them up. The buildings there utilized more bone and demonic materials than other parts of town and consisted of various pre-Belosian architectural styles, often hodge-podged together. “You nerds better keep up! I don’t have all night, you know,” Boscha called back to them.

Luz increased her pace, trying her absolute best to keep up.  _ Walking this fast the whole way is going to kill my legs. _ Amity’s shorter stature and fashionable ankle-boots, ill-suited for the walk, caused her to struggle to match their speed. She started to fall behind. Luz grabbed her hand and pulled her along her with a quick flash of a flirtatious grin. Amity responded with a censorious look and pulled her hand away.  _ Wow. She is really serious about this.  _ Luz redirected her attention and called out to the grudgby captain ahead of them, “Hey Boscha, what kind of ghosts do you normally summon?”

Boscha glanced back over her shoulder. “Cute ones,” she replied tersely. She continued leading the group for a moment, then suddenly slowed her walk and fell in line between them, causing Luz to scowl at the side of her head — _ What the heck!?— _ as she trudged along, physically separated from her girlfriend. Boscha was quiet for a half block before speaking again as they passed a building that had been made out of the carcass of a sea monster. She favored them each with a mischievous smirk. “So…How long have you two been dating?”

The unexpected question caught the pair off guard. Luz inhaled sharply. Amity sputtered and turned vaguely red. “Wha—what makes you say that?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” The grudgby captain stuck her hands in her pockets and cast her eyes up at the top of the buildings. “It’s just, no matter how fast I walk, you two keep getting back in step with each other. I can hear it.”

Luz caught an irritated look from Amity behind Boscha’s back. “That doesn’t mean anything!” she retorted.

Boscha’s grin spread wider. “And don’t think for a second I haven’t noticed those smoldering looks you’ve been giving each other.”

“Whatever.” Amity’s tone was flat, but Luz noticed a hint of a warning edge in it. Then she switched and adopted her older cruel mode of speaking. “I was wondering, Boscha. Why don’t you have a partner? You’re the most popular kid in school, right?”

The tall, athletic girl stopped short and turned on her. Her face was strained with barely controlled anger. She pointed an assertive finger at the Blight girl. “Hey! I can get a girlfriend, boyfriend, ghostfriend, or any other kind of partner I want!” She snorted disdainfully. “I just don’t have time for all that mushy stuff, is all.”

The green-haired witch stared her down for a moment. “Sure, Boscha.” Then she resumed walking and took the lead with the other two trailing behind. 

Luz sighed inwardly.  _ This is harder than I thought. How does Amity keep herself from messing up?  _ Amity had manipulated that exchange to put Boscha on the defensive, then take over the lead so that she and Luz were no longer side by side just to throw Boscha off. Luz didn’t feel up to that level of gameswomanship. She, herself, felt like she was going to explode from pent up affection.  _ I can’t help it. I’m just a hugger by nature! _ Apprehension set in. As they walked, Luz grew more certain that she would be the one to inevitably slip up and spoil their secret relationship.

They arrived at the outside of the Slayground. The streets there were even more narrow, and the architecture in the surrounding blocks was even more discordant. Confused. Muddled. Crumbling. Repairs and additions had been executed in different styles over a longer span of time. A wall made of a large reptilian hide had sagged and been reinforced with a red brick buttress, which itself had been patched with something resembling cement. Archways fused huge bones and blocks of granite. In some places, the roots of large teeth protruded. It was unclear if they had been added to the strange fabrications by the builders or embedded afterwards by terrifying creatures.

The low, metal barrier around the Slayground had been raised for the night by some sort of magic and formed a tall fence, and a gate had been set in place to block the entrance. It was locked with a padlock and chain. A sign hung on it that indicated it wouldn’t be open again until sunrise.

“So what now?” Boscha asked. “You guys have a plan or what?” Her tone was impatient and disapproving.

Amity and Luz looked around hesitantly. “It stands to reason that any bones under the buildings and streets would have been removed already or destroyed during construction. So, the best place to look would be under the Slayground.” Amity suggested.

Boscha raised her right and middle eyebrows. “And how are you going to tell the bone you need apart from any others you find? How do you even know it exists?”

“We’ll figure something out,” Luz said defensively. She ignored the second question. “Let’s just focus on getting in for now.” She pulled a handful of glyph cards from her waist pouch with the silly face to find one with an ice glyph. By that point, it was a standard trick for her to activate an ice glyph on the ground and launch herself over an obstacle. Before she could manage to do so, Boscha produced a vial of bright green liquid from her gym bag. She uncorked it and splashed a little of the substance on the lock. The shiny metal turned black and dissolved into a gloppy puddle with a sizzling hiss and unpleasant smell. Luz regarded the bully with surprise. “Whoa, potions power! You got any other cool stuff in there?”

Boscha shrugged with a sly expression on her contenance. “Yeah, duh. Some of it is legal...And some of it, not so much.” She pushed the gate open and stepped into the Slayground. “Come on, dorks.”

Luz glanced at her secret girlfriend. Amity didn’t look like she approved of how Boscha had handled the lock. Luz grimaced sympathetically and gestured for her to follow the other girl through the gate.

The grudgby captain had already surmounted the slide platform and watched them walk into the small park with an even more clever grin. “You guys want to see another necromancy spell that’ll make this go a ton faster?” She didn’t wait for them to reply one way or the other and moved her hand in a wide yellow circle in the air.

At first nothing perceptible happened. Then Luz heard a low rumble and looked down. The hard-packed dirt surface of the playground began to fracture below her feet.  _ Seriously? There’s no mulch or anything? Some kid is going to get hurt here.  _ The sand in the sandbox rippled and sloshed over the sides, as liquefaction set in. “What did you do!?” she cried out in alarm.

Boscha put her hands on her hips. “I figured you’re looking for bones, right? So I summoned skeletons.”

The ground around them ruptured with loud pops that sent clods of dirt flying into the air. The first things that emerged were rusty weapons of a variety of types. There were swords and axes, pikes and mauls, flails and daggers. These were followed in turn by skeletal arms, then shoulder joints, ribcages, spines, and other parts. The skeletons, numbering over a dozen, pulled themselves upright as if they were still connected with tendons and ligaments and encased in flesh. “Boscha!” Amity shouted indignantly.

The three-eyed girl laughed in wicked amusement at their predicament. “What? It’s a battle site, like you said. They don’t call it the Slayground for nothing.” She still held the high ground on the slide platform and regarded the situation from a position of relative security.

Luz backed up close to Amity as the shambling remains of ancient islanders surrounded them. Her foot fell on something long and round and nearly slipped out from under her. She gasped in surprise and looked down; a red bat that had evidently been forgotten by some child when the Slayground closed for the night.

Amity held up a finger and moved it in a practiced circle, leaving a glowing trail of pink magic in the air. A similar, but larger circle formed on the disturbed soil amongst the densest concentration of skeletons. An amorphous column of purple-colored sludge sprang up from the circle on the ground and coalesced into a vaguely humanoid shape. She commanded her abomination to attack. It’s thick arms swung out to both sides and scythed through the pack of skeletons that surrounded it. Bones, yellowed with age, went flying in all directions. Another three skeletons that had escaped the initial assault turned on the magical construct and began cleaving chunks of its viscous material from its form with their decrepit weapons. It flailed back at them with increasingly ineffective blows. The rest continued to close in on the two girls.

Luz reached down and picked up the red bat, an impulsive idea forming in her mind. It was not a strategy, or even quite a tactic. She reached into her waist pouch and pulled out a fistful of glyph cards. Without any particular care for the way they were arrayed, she pressed the glyphs into the surface of the bat, activating them as a sort of passive trap, the same as she had done to the massive spiked flail she chose at Grom. Only, the bat had multiple glyphs adhered to it haphazardly.

A skeleton lunged at her with a pike and Luz bashed at its tip with the bat, deflecting it away. A glyph flashed blue on the bat and a clump of ice formed around the pikehead, growing until it weighed down the long weapon. The skeleton wobbled sideways under the awkward load, struggling to bring the dangerous end of it to bear on her. Luz ran the face of the bat up the pike’s shaft and struck the skeleton in the ribs with a clatter. A glyph on the bat flashed green and verdant vines erupted from the dirt at the undead creature’s feet, engulfing it in flowering tendrils until it could not move. A pair of flowers not unlike daisies bloomed in the skeleton’s vacant eye sockets, giving it the appearance of comical shock.

Luz spun the bat into the spine of the next skeleton, which was raising a battleaxe over its skull. Her bat flashed yellow upon contact with its delicate vertebrae, and the ancient remains burst into flame, rapidly disintegrating into a pile of ash with its rusted axehead resting upon it. “Who wants to be cremated next?” she quipped loudly.

Another attacker wobbled up behind Amity with a dagger clutched in its phalanges. Luz moved to protect her and brought the bat down in an overhead arc onto its skull with a sickening crunch. A red flash came from one of the glyphs, indicating it was a healing spell. Fresh tissue spread over the skull, forming muscle, tendons, and cartilage, but not skin. The tissue was jagged around the gaping wound left by the bat and Luz could see grayish-pink matter within. The growing jacket of bodily substance extended as far as the base of its neck. The term ‘skeleton’ no longer quite sufficing as it possessed a modicum of flesh; the animated corpse let out a horrifying scream as it felt pain for the first time in millennia. It collapsed to the ground, shrieking and clawing at its skinless face with the bare bones of its fingertips.

Amity turned her head in astonishment to look at the monster writhing in agony behind her, and offered a solemn ‘Poggers’ with her eyes wide.

Luz’s stomach felt queasy at the morbid display, and she simply nodded in agreement.

Amity’s abomination had managed to defeat two of its three remaining opponents, but Amity was struggling, focusing her exertions on regenerating the clumps of purple matter that the final skeleton was lopping off with a longsword. The human extracted her bat from her struggling victim’s skull with a sloppy pop and took a step to advance on this final opponent when a glass bottle flew through the air and shattered against the skeleton’s shoulder, splashing it with its contents. The bones began to melt with a sizzling hiss and fell into a pile with an odor that reminded Luz vaguely of matches. She looked up at Boscha, who was leaning casually against the side of the slide platform.

“I hope I didn’t ruin that bone you were looking for,” the three-eyed girl said without a hint of contrition.

_ Oh, right. The bone!  _ Luz dropped the red bat and began examining the skeletons and other bones that had wormed up through the soil when Boscha had cast the summoning spell, kicking through piles with the toes of her shoes. “This guy lost his arm in battle, right? So I kinda don’t think it would be attached to a full body. We just need to figure out how to tell which one is the right one.” Amity joined her in scouring the Slayground for particularly auspicious-looking arm bones, electing to run a simple and orderly search pattern by the swings. She swept back and forth, stopping only to examine promising specimens.

“What about that one, dorks?” Boscha’s voice called out to them. 

Luz hesitated to even react due to the irreverent way the bully had been treating the two, thinking it to be a trick. But then Amity’s response brought her head up, “Holy Titan, that’s a big one!” Amity was kneeling in the sandbox and beginning to scoop handfuls of sand away from something.

The human girl rushed to look over her shoulder. Amity was uncovering a bone over three meters long and easily as thick as any of the girls. Luz’s memory was fuzzy on Boiling Isles anatomy, although she had looked at several diagrams in Mr. Skanderby’s healing track classroom. But she had to admit it did resemble some kind of humerus bone, albeit on a grand scale. “Wowsers, it looks like it came from a dinosaur!”

Amity glanced over her shoulder at her. “Is that some kind of demon in the human realm?”

“Uh. Yeah, it pretty much is,” Luz answered after a moment of consideration.

Amity stood back up. “But this isn’t right. It’s way too big. Let’s keep looking.”

“Whatever,” Boscha said as she sauntered up next to them after finally having come down from the slide platform. “You do you, I guess. But now I want to know what this thing came from.” She casually traced a yellow circle in the air above the massive bone with her finger.

“Boscha, no!” Amity shouted as a murky cloud wooshed out of cracks in the yellowed, ancient bone. It quickly filled the Slayground and blotted out the lights of the Old Quarter and the stars in the sky. The three girls couldn’t even see each other. Luz instinctively felt for Amity’s hand and found it, reassured that her girlfriend squeezed her back.

The cloud had a strange, oily texture and seemed preternaturally cold. Luz shivered involuntarily as an aethereal voice hissed in the darkness. It came from nowhere and everywhere at once. The tongue it spoke was not Islander, but a language she had never heard before with unfamiliar, guttural consonants and long, slippery intonation. “Wh—what is this?” she asked in naked fear.

Boscha’s voice came from somewhere nearby in the swirling cloud. “This is a phantom!”

The phantom’s bizarre vocalizations stopped and it released a deep chuckle that throbbed painfully in Luz’s ears. “They speak the slaves’ tongue,” it said with a heavy accent.

The cloud around the girls suddenly contracted and coalesced into the vaguely translucent form of a witch standing on the massive bone. He was tall with what had been a robust physique in life. A pair of horns in the shape of twisting spires projected from the top of his head among flowing hair. He had piercing eyes, dark like coal set in a round face with a prominent nose. A long beard fell from his chin to his beltline. His body was clad in a ghostly gray robe that wafted in imperceptible winds. One of his thick hands clutched a spectral staff of ornately carved ivory while his other hand hung limply at his side. The top of the staff had a bezel for connecting a palisman’s interlock, but the palisman was not present. He glared at each of them in turn, scrutinizing the girls who were frozen in a mixture of awe and terror. Amity quickly released Luz’s hand as his gaze passed over them. Finally, he settled on Boscha who tensed visibly but held in place. “At last! You have performed a great deed this day, returning me from the Spirit Realm. It has been twenty-fold centuries since these hallowed feet bestrode the great Titan.”

“Are you...Amun-Sipak?” Luz asked with greater temerity than she felt.

The phantom’s belly rippled as another harsh, throbbing laugh pulsed in Luz’s ears. “I am indeed. I sense that you did not release me as a result of my careful instructions.”

Amity and Luz slowly shook their heads without taking their eyes off the ghost of the ancient king.

His brow furrowed in impatience and he roared, “Then why have I been summoned!? Do you seek a painful death!?”

“Them!” Boscha spat out, pointing at the others. “Those two. They asked me to do it.”

Luz thought quickly, turning to her favorite source of inspiration.  _ In Azura and the Djinn of Djadanna, she bowed to the genie to earn his favor. _ She dropped to one knee and lowered her head while reaching out and pulling Amity down by the arm to do the same. “Great king, our intentions are humble. We seek your legendary benevolence.”

“Benevolence?” The phantom’s demeanor relaxed and he chortled. “That is what your legends say of me? Pah! Pray, what have you such need of that brought Amun-Sipak the All-Feared, the Harrower of Chester Valley, the Ravager of Spleensylvania, the Butcher of Elbonia...back from the dead.”

Amity bowed her head like Luz. “My lord, I seek knowledge of the lost Eye of Amun-Sipak, an amulet you once possessed.”

“And the secret of your magic door!” Luz added without looking up.

The long-dead king mused at them and, moving his staff in the crook of his elbow, stroked his beard thoughtfully with his good hand. “My Eyes. Powerful, are they. I brought these islands to their knees with them by my side. I wonder what you would do with them? Humble intentions, hmmph.” His gaze swept back to Boscha, who had been standing on the balls of her feet, perhaps waiting for an opportunity to flee. “And you, girl. You cast the spell that brought me here. What is it that you are after?”

Her three eyes blinked. “Me?” Then a cunning smile spread across her face and she seemed to relax, putting her hands on her hips and cocking her head to one side arrogantly. “You conquered the Boiling Isles, right? Teach me how. I want to conquer it too!”

Amity and Luz glanced at each other out of the corners of their eyes.  _ What is she doing!? She’s going to screw this up!  _ Amity’s concerned expression indicated she was thinking along similar lines.

“Ah - hahaha.” Amun-Sipak nodded in amusement. “Now you, I like. Straight to the point; not hiding behind unctuous verisimilitudes.” He regarded the other two scornfully for a moment before coming back to Boscha. “What are you called, girl?”

“I’m Boscha Newcombe. They call me the Grudgby Terror.” She stuck her thumb to her chest.

_ Grudgby Terror? Oh brother!  _ Luz huffed at the bully’s self-given epithet.  _ Boscha’s not that good. We would’ve beaten her if she hadn’t found that stupid rusty smidge. _

But Amun-Sipak let out a barking laugh that rattled her skull. “Boscha-Newcombe, the Terror of Grudgby. I like it! You will have to regale me with the tale of how you captured this city of Grudgby.” He gestured to her with his good hand. “Come. These others are unworthy of what they seek. But you will drown the Isles in blood, my new protege!” Boscha stepped forward without even glancing at Luz and Amity and followed the phantasmal king. Luz could hear her speaking loudly as she and Amun-Sipak left the Slayground.

Coming soon

Chapter 5: Grave Concerns


	5. Grave Concerns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amity and Luz shadow Boscha and the phantom of Amun-Sipak to their eventual destination.

Chapter 5 

Grave Concerns

The couple quickly agreed that it wouldn’t be wise to let an ancient, bloodthirsty phantom roam Bonesborough with Boscha. Amity explained to Luz that ghosts typically aren’t able to do any harm to the physical world, but all the same, they couldn’t let him take the bully under his figurative wing. She was ruthless and ambitious, and it would be a recipe for disaster. It had caught Amity off-guard that Boscha’s aspirations extended beyond dominating the Hexside social scene, and it filled her with unease. She had watched for years as Boscha aggressively pursued whatever she wanted, and invariably succeeded, with no regard for the repercussions to others. It stood to reason that combining Boscha with the experienced counsel of Amun-Sipak would not end well.

The two girls sneaked out of the Slayground, with Amity closing the gate and magically restoring the lock behind them, and followed the other pair at a safe distance. Boscha and Amun-Sipak cut across streets and through the warren of narrow snickelways that crisscrossed the Old Quarter with the secret girlfriends following behind. Amity led the way and made sure not to get too close, or let them get too far ahead. It was a delicate game of cat and mouse. On more than one occasion, she would hastily pull Luz into a recessed doorway or around a corner when Boscha looked back. Those were the most difficult moments; standing face to face in the dark with adrenaline pulsing through their veins and breath held. It thrilled her to her core. _Is it normal to be enjoying this...this danger?_ , she thought giddily. Amity wanted to pull Luz close to her by the front of her school uniform and fiercely press her lips to hers, but circumstances were not on their side; the chase was on.

It was not difficult to figure out where they were going, despite the constant twisting of the rambling snickelways. The massive Belosian Temple of the Titan loomed over the Old Quarter, and their direction invariably turned towards it again and again. It was an imposing edifice, built within a decade of the Emperor’s rise to power; its towering, contemporary aesthetic standing in stark contrast to the riot of architectural styles on display around it. The most important families in Bonesborough attended services at the Temple, including both the Blights and the Newcombes. Amity had been inducted into the Titanist faith there and many of the milestones of her life centered around it. It was likely she would even be married in that very building. Having that thought cross her mind as she slipped down the narrow passages between buildings side by side with Luz made her blush fiercely. _Marriage… Marrying Luz!? I guess we could get married - someday, I mean! Not now. It’s not like she can go home anymore, after all! But I’d have to figure out how to get it past my parents, somehow._ She was relieved that the human couldn’t see her countenance of mixed emotions in the dim light of the back streets.

A question prickled Amity’s mind as they entered the Temple grounds. _What do an ancient king and a high school witch want with a modern place of worship?_ They watched from a hiding in a nearby alley as Boscha destroyed another lock, this time on a door set into the outside of the transept that led to the Temple’s ossuary.

Members of the Temple who had passed away were ceremonially laid to rest in crypts under the foundations of the building itself. Amity had grandparents and several great aunts and uncles that were buried in the Blights’ section of the ossuary, which had been ostentatiously renovated as Odalia’s schemes bore fruit. She could still remember the layout of intersecting chambers from the most recent funeral she had attended, that of her great aunt, Asperity Blight, several years before. 

Asperity’s portrait hung in the hallway at the top of the stairs at Blight Manor. She remembered that the old witch would come to dinner every few months, and would criticize everything that her mother did in a way no one else would dare to do. The crass woman spoke her mind with an unflagging confidence that Amity secretly admired. She looked up to Asperity and her great aunt would dote on her, bringing her small gifts and calling on her birthday. She also remembered her mother angrily describing Asperity as a fickle, capricious old hag when she learned that she and Alador would inherit nothing in her will.

They waited several minutes before entering the ossuary, but once inside it wasn’t difficult to determine where Boscha and Amun-Sipak went. They followed the dull rumble of an explosion and the crash of breaking masonry, creeping along slowly between galleries of low, rectangular crypts until they found a wall reduced to rubble by one of Boscha’s potions. Chalky dust still lingered in the air alongside a noxious, alchemical odor. There was a space beyond the broken wall that Amity had no memory of. And yet, Boscha’s footprints were clearly visible in the dust on the other side when she created a small pink flame. 

She peered in cautiously. The other side was also apparently a burial ground, but instead of clean-lined marble crypts, exposed skeletons were laid in rough niches carved in bedrock walls and clotted with generations of cobwebs. She shuddered, remembering her temple teachers who had once described how the Temple had been built over the ruins of a Savage Ages site that belonged to some heretical order that Emperor Belos had destroyed in his great wisdom. _These must be the burial chambers for those people._ She wasn’t even sure what the beliefs of those heretics were. Her teachers had dismissed that subject as unimportant and moved on in the lesson.

As a child she had imagined that the wicked cultists had simply vanished and been replaced with her great grandparents who had appeared out of nowhere by the Titan’s will. Confronted with the dead bodies, she suddenly understood that Bonesborough’s community of heretics had been killed or forcibly converted to Belos’s version of Titanism. It was very likely that some of the bodies on the other side of the wall belonged to antecedents of her own family. Realization struck her in that moment. Belos had ruled the Boiling Isles for her entire life, but the Savage Ages were still very recent history. She had never thought to ask any of the older people she knew what it had been like before Belos, and she wondered why no one spoke of it. Surely some valuable historical assets would be lost with the fading generations.

They pressed on, following Boscha’s footprints into the catacombs of the heretics. Along with the niches, richly-detailed reliefs were carved into the walls. They didn’t have time to stop and examine them as they wended through narrow corridors, but from what Amity had gathered from quick glances, the scenes had some kind of religious meaning. One in particular affected her. It showed people carrying a body on their shoulders to the image of a person she took to be the Titan; not entirely surprising to find in the context of a necropolis, she supposed. She could tell it was the Titan because of the exaggerated size it was depicted in compared to the other figures, but also the expressions of reverence and fear on their faces. However, some of the details seemed to be off. The Titan was shown as a man with a beard and straight, spiraling horns who wore an elaborate-looking robe. He held a staff tipped with a spread-winged bat in one hand. His other arm ended in an empty sleeve. _What’s with the weird horns, and why did they think he only had one arm? A look at any map would tell them he had both?_

At last, the footprints led them to a dark corner of the catacombs. There they seemed to disappear. Amity stooped low to look closely at them. She detected a slight, half-moon disturbance in the dust against the base of the wall. The heel mark of Boscha’s boot. “I…I think they went through it, somehow.” She put her hand against the stone, but it felt solid and cold.

“Oh my gosh! Amity, look at this.” Luz had pointed to a circle carved into the wall. “This looks like a glyph for opening a door.” Indeed, the lines within the circle formed a rectangle and an adjacent parallelogram that made for a simplistic impression of an open door. “Hold on. I need to copy this real quick.” Luz pulled a blank glyph card and her pen out of her waist pack and duplicated the design. Then she touched the one carved in the wall. It flashed and the wall pivoted, fluidly and with minimal sound, on a hidden hinge, revealing yet another passageway beyond. It sloped downward. 

Amity held up her small pink flame and could make out Boscha’s footprints in the dust continuing into the darkness. There was no sign of the three-eyed girl or the phantom ahead. The tunnel had no intersections or corners or niches containing skeletons. There was also nowhere to hide. It led them in a straight line into the bowels of the Titan himself. Amity’s nerves were at a razor’s edge. She was prepared to extinguish her flame quickly if they spotted Boscha’s ahead. Luz, likewise, held an orb of light close in her hand, ready to snuff out at a moment’s notice. They trod as quietly as they could, and Luz slid an arm around her waist. Amity wasn’t sure if her girlfriend was being comforting, protective, or emoting her own unease, but she was grateful for it, regardless. She was beginning to understand that the human girl expressed herself physically. It was intrinsic, and as natural to her as breathing. A pang of guilt pierced her chest for asking Luz to pretend in public that they weren’t dating. _I wish there was some other way._

At last they came to the end of the claustrophobic tunnel. Amity peeked carefully through an ancient archway hewn in the solid stone, the same shade of gray as a heavy thundercloud. The archway was elaborately decorated with tessellating patterns and belied both the skill of the artisans that created it as well as the importance of the master they served. Before her was an immense cavern, the dimensions of which would have been unfathomable if not for the magical green flames that burned in a series of brass braziers down the center. Presumably, they had been activated by the presence of the spirit of Amun-Sipak and his new apprentice, whom she and Luz were still following. 

If the cavern was an artificial space made by Islander hands, it was impossible to tell. Millennia of dripping water formed stalactites that clung to the ceiling. It brought back a memory from when she had guided Luz out of the cave by the beach. It was a painful memory, and she regretted the way she had behaved after discovering that Luz was trying to figure out who the intended recipient of her Grom note was. _I should have just told her._ Her trepidation felt silly in retrospect. Luz was just as interested in her as she was in Luz. Amity caught sight of their quarry nearing the middle of open space and gasped as the newest set of braziers ignited, illuminating an unexpectedly large structure that filled the middle of the cave. “Poggers,” she whispered.

In response, Luz poked her head through the archway also, pressing her cheek against Amity’s in a way that caused the green-haired witch to blush. She looked around, taking in the stupendous opening that greatly contrasted the narrow underground passage they were standing in and concurred. “Yep…That’s definitely poggers.”

Coming soon:

Chapter 6: The Black Pyramid


	6. The Black Pyramid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amity and Luz enter the black pyramid to discover what Boscha and Amun-Sipak are up to

Chapter 6

The Black Pyramid

Luz and Amity watched as Boscha and the ancient king traversed farther and farther into the cavern. The braziers flared to life as they approached, creating an illuminated trail through the middle of the darkness. Water pooled on the cavern floor, collecting on either side of the path and reflecting green light from the magical fires onto the ceiling in ethereal, shimmering displays. As they got closer to the huge structure, the flickering flames began to reveal its shape and proportions. It was a black pyramid, stepped in design. The base took up nearly the width of the cavern. However, it didn’t come to a point at the top, rather terminating in a broad dais halfway to the cavern’s roof. A long stairway, set at a slightly less severe grade than the sides of the pyramid, ascended to the platform. Boscha and the glowing form of the phantom came to the steps and began to climb. Like the pathway across the floor of the cavern, the stairway was lined with magical braziers, igniting in pairs as the two ascended.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Amity murmured. The structure was utterly alien to her. There was not another one on the surface of the Isles or in her history books, nor was there even a ruin that looked anything like it.

Luz leaned in close. “It’s a pyramid. We have them in the human realm.”

“What are they for?”

“Usually, they’re for worshipping gods or tyrants. Or tyrants that act like gods. That sort of thing.”

_ It must have been built by the heretics,  _ Amity thought. It chilled her to think that her own ancestors might have had a hand in something so blasphemous.  _ How did they use this to worship the Titan? Where did that idea come from? It’s not like anything we do now. The Savage Ages were so different than I was taught! _

The girls tracked the progress of their quarry by the braziers that blazed up. It was only when Boscha and the phantom reached the middle of the stairs that Amity and Luz set out on the path across the floor of the cavern, passing through the halos of light around each fire as stealthily as possible. They found the path to be made of closely fit cobbles, and strewn with bits of rubble that had fallen from the ceiling in the interminable centuries since the pyramid had been built. Amity kept an eye on Boscha as they went. It became clear that Amun-Sipak was taking her to the top of the pyramid.  _ Why though? What does this terrible place have to do with conquering the Boiling Isles?  _ Whatever the reason, Amity didn’t like it.

At last they made it to the base of the stairway. Judging by the green fires, Boscha and Amun-Sipak were at the top. Up close, the pyramid was made of the same dark gray stone as the archway, carved in varying bands with geometric patterns, stylized motifs of wild demons, and scenes of people engaged in worship, warfare, and feasting. Each square-shaped tier of the pyramid was two dozen feet tall, and there were tens of tiers, each one proportionately smaller than the one below it like a giant, ominous cake. The braziers that flanked the stairs were held in place by grotesque statues of Islanders of various morphologies or demons. Many seemed to reach out as if to grasp anyone who might try to ascend.

Amity put her foot on the first step, then turned to Luz. “Don’t touch anything. I don’t like the look of this place.”

“No problemo, girlfriend-ah,” she replied with a mock salute. “There probably aren’t even any big, red buttons to push.”

The green-haired witch led the way, testing each stair with her toe before taking a step as they slowly made their way towards the top, where Boscha and Amun-Sipak were.  _ What is going on up there?  _ She could imagine the phantom teaching Boscha a long-forgotten spell or showing her some kind of devastating weapon.  _ Maybe he’s even giving her the Eye. _

They came to the top of the first tier when Luz grabbed her arm. The narrow, horizontal surface extended into the void on either side of the stairs, a trail of blackness in the rippling reflections of the green fire. It extended both directions until it was lost in nothingness. Luz pointed to the nearest brazier. “Check it out! It looks just like King.”

Indeed, Amity recognized the demon holding up the brass bowl of fire. The statue looked remarkably similar to the one her girlfriend’s mentor kept as a pet…or something. Amity was still fuzzy on what their relationship was. “Isn’t it a bit, you know, huge to be your demon?” The creature had the same skull, albeit with both horns intact, but its thick body rippled with muscle mass. She was almost sure that it would have stood over eight feet in height if it weren’t crouching low under the weight of the brazier perched on its back. One of its three-clawed hands reached out as if to grasp something.  _ Knowing him, he was probably reaching for a snack,  _ she thought acerbically.

“Yeah!” Luz addressed the statue, “King, you looking good, bro!” She brought her hand up playfully.

“Luz, no!” Amity grabbed at her girlfriend’s wrist in vain, trying to stop her. But even as she reached, she realized that it was too late. The high five connected with the palm of the statue's paw, causing it to shift almost imperceptibly as the step under their feet trembled with a deep grinding sound. Before they could react, it disappeared. 

And within a heartbeat, the two plummeted into the darkness underneath.

They landed in a heap some distance below in a cloud of choking dust. It was pitch black other than a small rectangle overhead through which they could see the ripples of green light reflecting on the cavern’s stalactites.  _ Ugh. Where are we?  _ Amity traced a circle with her finger and produced a small tongue of pink flame that she held in her hand. Luz sat up next to her and fiddled with her waist pouch. The fall had knocked one of the googly eyes off its silly face, leaving a plaque of dried glue. “I thought I asked you not to touch anything,” Amity said with a harsher tone than she intended.

“I just can’t help it,” Luz smiled. “Hands are like the big, red buttons of ancient statuary.”

Amity grumbled irritably and brushed herself off. She knew that Luz was trying to lighten the mood, but it felt like she was downplaying her mistake.

“Are you mad at me?”

She sighed. “No. It’s my fault. I shouldn't have gotten you involved in Blight business.”

Luz stood as well and put a hand on her shoulder. “As if I was going to let my brand new girlfriend chase ghosts into underground pyramids all by herself. Speaking of which...” She extracted a light glyph from her pouch and activated it, creating an orb that floated above them. 

They found themselves in a corridor. The ceiling above was vaulted to support the outer stairs. The hole they had fallen through seemed exceedingly small, high above them. The floor was made of tightly laid blocks and the walls were formed by a series of megalithic stones. Their surfaces were carved with funerary scenes superficially similar to the ones in the catacombs they had passed through. Amity examined them, careful not to trigger any more traps. Instead of scenes of bodies being taken to the heretical Titan, they showed processions of people bearing offerings. They carried large jars or chests or piles of bread. Demons were led by ropes, as if they were slaves. Wagon-loads of treasures were drawn away from where they stood, down the corridor. 

“Let’s see where this goes. Maybe we can find a way out and figure out how to stop Amun-Sipak.” Amity whispered and took the lead again.

They followed the offerings being carried on the walls, deep into the heart of the pyramid, passing by musicians, dancers, Islanders carrying books, lamps, and even something that looked like a board game.  _ I’m getting the feeling that whoever all those things were for is buried in here somewhere.  _ They pushed forward, their lights only illuminating a short distance ahead and behind them at any given time, making it difficult to measure their progress. Even time seemed inconstant. Amity began to seriously consider whether they’d fallen into some kind of recursion spell trap. Just as she was about to ask for Luz’s pen to mark the wall and test the theory, the corridor opened into a large hall.

Luz activated more light orbs and sent them out into the room so they could get a sense of its size and look around. Amity mentally estimated it occupied half the volume of the pyramid with another vaulted ceiling ranging above them. More braziers, unlit, lined the perimeter. They both gasped as their lights revealed life-like statues of Islanders armed with weapons and arranged in parade formation. In the center of the room was something akin to a high stage with an irregular shape to which the statues below were facing, almost as if awaiting orders. Amity imagined all of it must have had some kind of ceremonial purpose, and that perhaps the crypt of the person all the offerings were for was located on the strange stage. They walked towards it uncertainly, the green-haired witch eyeing the army of statues in case any of them suddenly moved.

“Amity, look!” Luz gasped as one of her orbs pushed into the shadows at the peak of the ceiling. 

Amity’s eyes went agog as she saw what Luz had spotted. Hanging by a long loop of thick chain was a disk bigger than a dinner plate. It bore a large design of a slit-pupiled eye. They began to walk down a wide aisle between statues toward the stage in the center. 

“This must be where Amun-Sipak is buried! That must be his Eye! We need to get it down. I have to bring it to my parents.”

“What!?” Luz exclaimed. “That looks just like the eye that was on Eda’s door. The door I used to get to the Boiling Isles. If I take it to Eda, maybe we can make another door and I can get home!” 

Amity realized Luz was right. It looked very much like the eye on the door that Grometheus had turned into in the pit under the Hexside gymnasium, which was apparently a duplicate of the one Luz came through from the human realm. She turned and looked at her girlfriend. “But Luz, that thing is the whole reason I came down here! I need it.”

Luz glared back at her with an intensity that set her aback. “What are your parents going to do with it? Give it to Belos? He tried to take Eda’s door, remember? He wanted to Unify my realm...or something! I don’t even know what that means, but it sounded bad!”

_Why is Luz being so selfish? I told her this is what I was looking for from the very beginning and suddenly she’s trying to take it from me and leave!_ Amity bristled at the thought, glaring right back at her girlfriend. “What do you want to go home for, anyway!? We’ve only been on one date! What’s your hurry?”

The human girl’s firm expression gradually melted. She broke eye contact, turned away, and fell to her knees, covering her face with her hands. “I...I just want to be able to see my mom again. I don’t want to stay there forever.”

“I—Luz. I didn’t…I’m sorry,” Amity’s breath caught in her chest as a wave of guilt flooded the pit of her stomach.  _ I’ve been a fool. I didn’t realize...But what are we going to do? My family has been given this task by Belos himself. My parents asked for it. If I let Luz take it to the Owl Lady, it might ruin us. Or worse. _

Suddenly, the braziers that surrounded them roared to life with green flames licking the air. The deep, burbling laughter of the terrible phantom throbbed in their ears. “Ha ha ha ha! What do we have here?”

“Well master, you were right. They did follow us.” Boscha’s voice responded.

Amity’s eyes cast about to find where the voices were coming from and spotted the grudgby captain sitting on the edge of the stage in the center of the room. She was holding a knife, examining its irregular blade. It was strange and primitive to Amity’s eyes, made of knapped obsidian with a hilt that was little more than a strip of old leather wrapped around it. The glassy, black volcanic stone, while not the most artful medium, could hold an edge sharper than any metal.

She heard Luz shout in fright and whirled around to see Amun-Sipak’s ghost standing behind them, blocking the corridor. “Yes. It was quite expeditious. We needn’t bother finding a victim for our little ceremony.” His piercing eyes flashed with red fire. “Seize them.”

Boscha leaped down from the stage and charged up the aisle towards the two. Amity swiftly traced a circle in the air and an abomination erupted from a pink circle on the floor in the three-eyed girl’s path. But she was ready for it, hurling a bottled potion at the magical construct directly from a pocket in her gym bag. It broke on contact and mixed into the abomination’s matrix, neutralizing Amity’s spell that was holding it together. It collapsed to the floor with a splash that splattered the statues around it. Boscha dashed through the puddle with all the alacrity that she brought to bear against her opponents on the grudgby pitch.

“Boscha!” Luz shouted and reached to pull a glyph from her waist pouch.

Boscha traced a yellow circle with the obsidian knife as she ran. “I don’t think so, human!” Luz’s pouch burst into flames. It was the same spell Amity had tried to use to incinerate her own Grom-posal note when Emira and Edric had blackmailed her. Only Luz didn’t have a counter-spell.

“G’ah!” Luz fumbled with the buckle in haste, then threw it to the floor. The conflagration consumed the vinyl pouch and all of her cards within seconds. “What?! No!” She fell to her hands and knees and tried to blow out the flames, but only succeeded in scattering ash and embers. 

As Amity watched in disbelief, a round, glass bottle crashed to the floor at her feet. The pale green potion it contained vaporized into a cloud that spread rapidly. A hint of the fumes wafted into her face and the harsh odor made her cough. “Luz! Run!” Amity tried to pull her girlfriend to her feet, but her throat burned and her eyes watered. She panicked. Turning, she stumbled blindly into a nearby statue, toppling it into the one next to it, then dashed away, hiding among the ranks of the stationary army and trying to rub the itching pain out of her eyes and nose.

“The human’s out like a light,” she heard Boscha say at a distance.

Amun-Sipak growled, “Good, take her. Leave the other; she shan’t be getting out of here.”

Coming soon

Chapter 7: Heartstopper


	7. Heartstopper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luz regains consciousness in the midst of a dire situation

Chapter 7

Heartstopper

Luz’s eyes flickered open and she stared out into space, trying to make sense of the mirage of waving green lines propagating across her field of vision.  _ Where am I?  _ The last thing she remembered was seeing a pair of shoes, though she couldn’t immediately place who it was that they belonged to.  _ Were they Amity’s? Maybe Boscha’s? _ The memory wasn’t clear and thinking about it made her head hurt. As she watched the flashes of color cavort in front of her, Luz felt her faculties begin to return, and the moving patterns before eyes started to make sense. After a few moments of collecting her thoughts, Luz realized that she was outside of the pyramid, in the cavern, seeing the reflections of the green firelight on the stalactites overhead.

Some kind of residue was caked around her eyes and nose and made them itch. She concluded it was dried secretions and tried to wipe it away with her hand—which didn’t move. Neither did the other one. She pulled harder. Despite her efforts, they were stuck in place, outstretched above her head. Something chafed her wrists, and her fingers tingled from reduced blood flow. She tried the same with her legs as well, but to her increasing dismay, they wouldn’t budge either. She felt a chill of fear at realizing her vulnerability.  _ I’m tied down! _ She strained her muscles, but it was no use. The bindings were tight and strong.  _ Curses! I bet Azura could have broken out of here. Stupid nerd arms! _

The human turned her head from side to side, trying to get a bearing on her surroundings. From what she could tell, she was laying on some kind of stone table. She could feel the edges with her fingers and heels. There was a stone surface a few feet below the table. It was dozens of feet across and seemed to hang in space by itself. Beside the table was a round, empty basin, carved from a solid piece of stone. At the bottom of the basin was a hole. From her angle she could not see where it led. It was not entirely unlike a bathroom sink, she thought, albeit without any faucets. Although she was confident that wherever this place was, she was likely still in the cavern, the path of braziers, the pools of water, and the pyramid were nowhere in sight.  _ Where could they be? Where’s Amity? Where am I?  _

Her eyes widened in horror as another realization struck.  _ I’m on top of the pyramid!  _ The dais was clearly bigger than it had looked from below.

She heard the voice of someone approaching. Luz’s first instinct was to call out for help.  _ Maybe it’s Amity! _ But then she remembered that Boscha had attacked her, burned her glyph cards, and presumably tied her to the altar, and she closed her eyes again.  _ She’s probably around somewhere, so it’s better to play it safe, since I can’t really move.  _ Luz grimaced at the thought of Boscha carrying her up to the top of the pyramid and restraining her there.  _ How is she so good at tying people up anyway? That’s kind of worrisome. _

Amun-Sipak’s grinding tone responded to the first speaker as they surmounted the top of the pyramid. “It is time. I’ll brook no more dissent from you, apprentice. Cut out her heart. We need blood taken directly from it for the ritual.”

Luz stiffened when she heard his words, and she opened her eyes to see Boscha standing over her with the obsidian blade poised in her hand. Instead of wilting, a fresh anger coursed through her veins. “You can’t have my heart! It belongs to someone else!”

Boscha seemed to be taken by surprise as she looked down at the resilience in her eyes. The apprentice hesitated, processing Luz’s words. Her countenance was inscrutable.

“What’s wrong, Bosch? Afraid to get your hands messy?” Luz blew a raspberry at her reluctant executor.

Just then, a horrific screech filled the air and reverberated through the immense cavern. Boscha’s concentration broke and she turned, only to be plowed off her feet by a rushing mass of purple. Luz turned her head and saw the three-eyed girl wrestling with an abomination against the basin. Then, craning her neck and looking between her feet, she grinned triumphantly. Amity stood just at the edge of the dais, focusing her magic into a large pink circle that radiated power, warping the translucent properties of the air around it. It was the most impressive display of magic Luz had ever seen Amity do.

The apparition of Amun-Sipak was standing at the center of it all, his good arm holding his palisman-less staff above him. “It’s that other one. I’ll deal with her myself. Get back to cutting out the heart!” 

As he spoke, the green fire in the braziers that flanked the stairs extended serpentine-like into the air, weaving into a sinuous tendril of flame that rose up behind Amity and honed in on the green-haired witch.

“Amity, look out!” Luz cried. 

Her girlfriend turned her head slightly and spotted the threat behind her out of the corner of her eye. She took her left hand from the raging pink focus circle and scried another onto the air next to it. “Banish dead!” A shaft of dark gray energy shot out of the second circle and struck the ghost in his chest. 

The green fires behind Amity faltered and withdrew, retreating to the braziers where they remained burning as before. The ghost vanished in the blink of an eye, not even making a sound as he disappeared.

Amity released the abomination and rushed to Luz. “Are you okay?” Her voice was tight with concern. She looked at the ropes and quickly summoned her small pink flame to burn them away, watching as the bindings withered into a small pile of ash.

Luz sat up and rubbed her hands. Her fingers still tingled from the constriction. “I’m fine. What was that thing you did? Did it kill him?”

“I don’t know! I’ve never tried it before.” Amity cast her gaze down sheepishly. “It was a necromancy spell. It’s forbidden magic.”

Luz shot her a roguish grin. “Oh! I’ve got a girlfriend with a dark side. Nice! But don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.” Then she gasped — _ Oh, shoot!— _ realizing what she had said out loud and looked around for Boscha. Amity’s abomination had already dissolved. There was nothing but silence. The three-eyed witch was slumped over the stone basin, face down and unmoving.

“No, no-no-no-no!” Amity saw her too and was on the verge of panic. Luz climbed down from the altar, and together, they rolled the girl over and off of the basin. A thick, bright red fluid coated the inside of it and dripped into the drain hole. Luz looked at Boscha. The girl’s normally pink complexion was disturbingly pale. Even her lips lacked color. The leather-wrapped hilt of the obsidian knife jutted out of the center of her chest, between the buttons of her letter jacket. It too was wet with blood that had flowed down its irregular contours in rivulets.

Luz glanced up at Amity. Her girlfriend’s eyes were welling up with tears. “It’s not your fault, Am! You saved me. You did what you had to do.” It wasn’t quite true. Boscha had hesitated for some reason. But it was what the green-haired girl needed to hear.

“Is she…?” Amity whispered. Apprehension and guilt mixed into her voice.

The human bent down and placed a pair of fingers on the side of Boscha’s throat. It was a trick her mother, an ER nurse, had taught her. She could feel a faint pulse.  _ She’s alive! _ Luz’s other hand went immediately to her waist, then she remembered that her glyph cards were gone.  _ Blast!  _ She looked around. “Uh...Get me a piece of rope with a burnt end!”

Amity jumped and quickly fetched one from the altar while Luz tore open the buttons on Boscha’s jacket. The knife had ripped her uniform cowl and tunic. Luz grasped the material in her fingers and pulled the ragged edges apart, exposing Boscha’s sports bra beneath. The whole length of the blade had gone into her skin just above the bra, bisecting her sternum and shredding the right ventricle of her heart.

Luz held up her hand and Amity placed the burnt end of a rope in it. She turned it around and gripped it like a paintbrush, then scrawled a healing glyph directly on Boscha’s chest around the knife with soot.

She dropped the rope and wrapped her hand around the hilt of the knife, feeling the wet blood squelch between her fingers. She hesitated for a moment to focus her mind, pushing away all distraction, then yanked the blade free with a sickening slurp. At the same moment, she activated the glyph, imagining the bone and tissue knitting together. The wound hissed and sizzled angrily as it closed up and suddenly Boscha arched her back, keening in agony. Luz had never heard anything like it before. Not in the human realm. Not in the Boiling Isles. It was the sound of pure torment.

At last, the girl relaxed against the cold stone of the pyramid. Her three eyes regarded them vengefully. She realized her clothing was torn apart and tried to close her jacket, fingers fumbling weakly with the snaps. “What in Titan’s name did you do to me!?” she slurred.

Luz glanced at Amity to share her annoyance then addressed Boscha indignantly, “I just saved your life. The least you could do is thank me.”

Boscha stared up at her with a stoney expression, then finally relented. “Thanks, or whatever,” she mumbled. “I need my bag. Now.”

Amity jumped up again. She had evidently seen Boscha’s gym bag during the quick fight and ran to get it. Luz had no idea where it was; she hadn’t been in the most opportune position to look around. Amity brought it back and set it down next to Boscha, who rolled onto her side and fished around in the main pocket until she extracted a vial with an opaque blue liquid inside. 

She pulled the cork and quickly quaffed it with a puckered face. “Titan, that tastes worse than cafeteria not-dogs.” She sat up and drew a deep breath, letting the potion work its magic.

Luz wasn’t sure what to do about her. Boscha had initially joined them on the venture, then betrayed them. But she’d also hesitated when ordered to kill Luz. And she had just nearly died.  _ Should we leave her here? Take her? Can we even trust her?  _ “Are...you going to be okay? You just lost a lot of blood. Do you need some water or something? Do you want us to go for help?”

“Just—” Boscha turned her face away from them and hid it in her hands, her shoulders convulsing in sobs. “Why are you doing this? Why are you being nice to me!? Just fucking go! Leave me alone!” she yelled, her voice ragged with emotion.

Luz was taken aback by her forcefulness. “But…”

“Let’s just get the Eye and go.” Amity grabbed her arm and held her gaze with a stern look that said she wasn’t interested in doing the bully any more favors. “We will figure out what to do with it when we get back up to the surface.”

Coming soon

Chapter 8: A Rebirth in Blood

**Author's Note:**

> Cover art by: TurquoiseGirl35
> 
> Special thanks to my beta readers, my artists, and the Good Witch Society
> 
> The Good Witch Society is a collective of creative minds dedicated to art, writing, music, and more in The Owl House fandom. If you are interested join our Discord server: https://discord.gg/pRK6QN2M


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